


Mamma Mia!

by translorastyrell (nerddowell)



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Based on Abba songs, Borderline Personality Disorder, Eating Disorders, Flash Fic, Fluff, M/M, because I love Oberyn/Renly, if I have to fill this tag myself so help me I will
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-05
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-22 02:47:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,264
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15571992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerddowell/pseuds/translorastyrell
Summary: Bethon Tumblr has some brutal and beautiful Renly headcanons and, since I have been on night duty all week with nothing better to do than to write flashfic based on ABBA songs and flesh out those headcanons with her, the results are these.Here, Beth, you heartless wench. Enjoy them.





	1. Mamma Mia!

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rensbarath](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rensbarath/gifts).



> I wrote these in the time it took for the song they're based on to play all the way through, so some are longer than others. Some of these might also require a little bit of explaining, in which case, the headcanon post they're based on is [here](http://translorastyrell.tumblr.com/post/176638058602/more-renly-baratheon-headcanons).
> 
> Trigger warnings: homophobia/gaybashing, mental illness (esp. BPD, eating disorder), sex as a form of self-damaging behaviour, canon character death.

  1. **HONEY, HONEY**  
Renly is shaking on the bed. It’s not the first time they’ve tried playing around with food in the bedroom - they’ve tried whipped cream before (pleasant, but cold), chocolate (fun, but gave them both a heart attack when they went to do the wash and found out it’d leaked onto the mattress and looked like someone had had an unfortunate accident), and writing icing (sticky, just sticky); but he’s going to need a minute to unsee his boyfriend morphing into the Honey Monster from the cereal adverts in front of his very eyes as he licked the viscous amber fluid from the spoon.  
  

  2. **MONEY, MONEY, MONEY**  
Stannis is woken by Robert’s furious voice telling their younger brother to ‘bugger off, Renly, it’s five in the morning!’ thirty seconds before his bed is invaded by a sobbing six year old. He can hear Renly’s stomach rumbling; his little brother curls up under the blankets, sniffling, and whimpers into his ear, ‘Please, Stannis, I’m so hungry...’  
Stannis drags himself out of the bed, wrapping Renly up in the duvets, and promises to see what he can scrape up for breakfast, but when he gets to the kitchen, every last cupboard is empty.  
  

  3. **MAMMA MIA!**  
The hole in his chest is still raw and aching from their parting, even if he has met someone else since. He’s not seen Oberyn since that last evening in Seville, when the older man dropped him off at the train station with a smile and a kiss, his voice husky; he’s not seen him in four years, and yet Renly  _still_  goes weak at the knees to catch a glimpse of him across the airport arrivals lounge.  
  

  4. **DANCING QUEEN  
** They’re collected around the smouldering embers of the barbecue, Ellaria and Oberyn both with joints in their hands, Damon fiddling with the stereo and changing over the radio station. A song comes on, some Spanish singer with a sultry, wine-soaked voice; Oberyn grins, taking a drag on his joint before passing it to Renly. The seventeen-year-old is bright-eyed and infatuated, and the moment Oberyn stands up and pulls him close to dance, he’s in heaven.  
  

  5. **OUR LAST SUMMER**  
Oberyn’s neither the first nor the last love Renly comes across on his gap year. He is, of course, the most important, the most lasting; after all, Renly had lingered nearly three months longer in Seville than first anticipated, partly because he loves the city but mostly because he loved one of its inhabitants. After Oberyn waves him off from the train station platform, however, he makes his way to Lisbon; there, he meets several more men who share his hostel bed for a couple of nights at a time. No matter how he tries, however, Oberyn’s is the only name that ever wants to come to his lips, the only face in his mind’s eye.  
  

  6. **LAY ALL YOUR LOVE ON ME  
** The last place Renly is expecting to find love is the beach, let alone with the bloody lifeguard. And he’s not sure when his life turned into an episode of  _Baywatch_  - him swallowing what feels like half the sea as he surfaces from a dive to see a lifeguard who wouldn’t look out of place as a Greek statue staring right at him.  
He’s not surprised that said lifeguard thinks he’s drowning. After all, he’s suddenly coughing and spluttering and generally flailing about, but when deities walk the earth, the rest of the mere mortals are bound to have a bit of an overreaction. It’s not intentional - it’s  _not_  - but if it gets the lifeguard to come over and haul him out of the sea with warm hands on his shoulders and brown eyes like honey and amber, then he’s not going to complain.  
  

  7. **SUPER TROUPER**  
Renly’s had enough of this tour, in all honesty. It might have been his dream since he was ten years old and first saw the stage show to be in  _Les Misérables_ , but he’s exhausted. It doesn’t help, either, that he’s playing Grantaire and  _of course_  life is imitating art with his positively debilitating crush on the bloke playing Enjolras. He’s the hottest person Renly’s ever seen, all golden curls and brown eyes blazing with righteous anger, and he looks  _so good_  in that red waistcoat that Renly goes thick-tongued and starry-eyed every time he catches sight of him.  
  

  8. **GIMME! GIMME! GIMME! (A MAN AFTER MIDNIGHT)**  
He knows it’s a terrible idea. He knows that Robb is going to give him that look, that horrible sad look with the kicked-puppy eyes and the limp smile, in the morning at school. He also knows that if Stannis catches him in a club at sixteen, he’s going to have  _two_  assholes instead of one. So when the guy he’s been dancing with grins and pulls him close to mouth at his neck and whisper in his ear, ‘Yours or mine?’ Renly smiles and kisses him. ‘Yours.’  
He won’t remember the guy’s name in the morning, probably won’t even remember where they met, but as far as Renly’s concerned, if he can feel loved - if he can feel  _wanted_  - for half an hour tonight, he’ll be happy.  
  

  9. **THE NAME OF THE GAME**  
_From: Loras, 12:31am_  
_help!! relationship advice required_  
  
_From: Margaery, 12:32am_  
_One of these days I’m not going to answer. x_  
  
_From: Loras, 12:33am_  
_no ur not u like the gossip 2 much_  
  
_From: Margaery, 12:35am_  
_True. x_  
_From: Margaery, 12:35am_  
_Okay. What’s wrong? x_  
  
_From: Loras, 12:40am_  
_how early is 2 early for i love you? dont want to scare him off_  
  
_From: Margaery, 12:42am_  
_BRB. Got to check Cosmo. x_  
_From: Margaery, 12:43am_  
_Cosmo useless. Just say it. Seize the day! x_  
  
_From: Loras, 12:44am_  
_said it_  
_From: Loras, 12:44am_  
_he cried_  
_From: Loras, 12:44am_  
_think its good news_  

  10. **VOULEZ-VOUS**  
Renly’s sixteen, music too loud in his ears and his heartbeat thrumming in his ears. The ecstasy someone gave him - passed on their tongue in a kiss that left him dizzy and a little in love - has him sweating through his thin tshirt, able to feel every pulse of the beat tickling over his skin like electricity. A tall blonde with the most amazing violet eyes Renly’s ever seen - truly  _violet_ , not blue - wraps an arm around his waist, presses him up against one of the pillar lights, his skin burningly hot against Renly’s and his lips warm and wet where they suck his pulse point. He’s asking him something, something he can’t hear and doesn’t care about, and Renly just nods fervently as the man smiles and drags him towards the men’s toilets by the hand.  
  

  11. **SOS**  
It physically pains Renly to watch this scene. Pierce Brosnan should never have been allowed to do a musical; the man couldn’t carry a tune if you gave him a basket. Loras still hasn’t forgiven him for subjecting him to the movie for their fifth date, and the sound of Sam struggling his way through  _SOS_  had been the nail in the coffin of Renly’s chances of getting laid that night, although Loras did soften up enough to allow him a blowjob when Renly gave him the last piece of popcorn.  
  

  12. **DOES YOUR MOTHER KNOW?**  
_From: Robb <3, 2:51am_  
_Please tell me you’re not doing what I think you are._  
  
_From: Renly, 3:01am_  
_:)))))))_  
  
_From: Robb <3, 3:01am_  
_Do I need to come and get you?_  
_From: Robb <3, 3:03am_  
_Also, we’re talking about this tomorrow._  
  
_From: Renly, 3:14am_  
_hes hott im not levain g_  
  
_From: Robb <3, 3:15am_  
_Are you high, or just drunk?_  
  
_From: Renly, 3:32am_  
_:)))))))))_  
  
_From: Robb <3, 3:33am_  
_I’m coming to get you._  
  

  13. **SLIPPING THROUGH MY FINGERS  
** Cassana and Steffon Baratheon lived just long enough to see their youngest son start nursery, Renly crying and clinging to his mother’s shirt as she leaned down to kiss him goodbye. It crucified her to leave him behind, two years old and the sweetest of her three children; not boisterous like Robert or sullen like Stannis, full of bright smiles and laughter and always happy to climb onto her knee for a story or a cuddle.  
When Stannis is pulled out of his fourth period Maths lesson, he wonders if his little brother maybe knew something was wrong that morning. Steffon and Cassana won’t be coming to pick either of them up after school.  
  

  14. **THE WINNER TAKES IT ALL**  
The fight isn’t, in all honesty, a fight; instead it’s a giving-up of sorts. They’ve been blowing up at each other for weeks, raging, screaming arguments that have left both in tears and licking their wounds behind closed doors in different bedrooms. Renly hasn’t grieved like this in his entire life, having been too young to really remember the deaths of his parents. Loras is the one to call it off, to pack his things in boxes and move out, whilst Renly sits with a bottle of scotch and a broken heart.  
  

  15. **WHEN ALL IS SAID & DONE**  
Margaery wants to kill Loras for it, really. Her brother is the most obtuse, idiotic person alive; he knows, in his heart of hearts, that Renly loves him, because it’s obvious just from looking at him. And yet, Loras has let insecurity get to him, insecurity and jealousy and that ridiculous and long-burning grudge, and now he’s pushed Renly away.  
  

  16. **TAKE A CHANCE ON ME**  
The boy’s still practically wet behind the ears, an adorable, dimple-cheeked English boy with the bluest eyes and the blackest hair, and he’s got a charmingly lopsided smile so wide his eyes narrow to slits as his cheeks bunch up. And yet, there’s something fragile about him, a small boy deeply buried in that handsome young man’s body who’s crying out for someone to look after him, to make him feel loved. Having a soft spot for a sweet smile and sad eyes isn’t a charge often laid at Oberyn Martell’s door, but he defies anyone to be able to look at Renly Baratheon and not immediately want to give the poor lad the sun, moon and stars.  
  

  17. **I HAVE A DREAM**  
Renly always wanted to go abroad. Stannis and Robert told him they’d been to France once with their parents for the summer, when Renly was a baby, to attend a relative’s wedding in Nice; but Renly wants to see the Parthenon, to climb up to Machu Picchu, and feel the spray of Niagara Falls on his face, to experience the world. It’s that that sends him off on a backpacking holiday when he turns seventeen, the summer before his final year of sixth form, using most of the money their parents had left him. He reaches Seville, and falls in love with Spain and with the dark-eyed handsome Chilean he meets in a bar.




	2. Mamma Mia! (Here We Go Again)

  1. **WHEN I KISSED THE TEACHER**  
Loras probably would’ve gotten better grades in his first year The Tudors  & Power in Wales module if he hadn’t been so busy staring at the seminar leader’s arse whenever he turned around. And Renly seemed to spend a lot of time lounging on desks and stretching out, his body long and lithe and lightly muscled under those tight chinos and thin shirts.  

  2. **I WONDER**  
He sits in the airport departure lounge scrolling through his phone, tapping out a text to Robb. He’s going to miss the younger boy when he goes to Europe; after all, Robb’s been his best friend for several years, has dealt with an awful lot of the shit Renly’s been through right there alongside him, picked up the pieces of God knows how many failed relationships and one-night stands gone wrong. He doesn’t want him to worry.  
He’s still on the phone to Robb when his flight’s called, saying a hasty goodbye to the younger boy as he picks up his luggage and his passport, stepping towards the stewardess at her desk and feeling his stomach tie itself in knots at the thought of heading out into the world on his own.  

  3. **ONE OF US**  
He’d promised himself - and more importantly, Robb - that he wouldn’t do this. Only he would go on a backpacking trip and fall in love with the first man he met, to the point that he deliberately missed trains, planes, everything that was meant to take him further on his journey, all so that he could spend a few more days in his lover’s arms. The decision has been made for him at last, Oberyn driving him to the train station himself. He’s kind but firm as he deposits Renly inside the carriage and says farewell.   
Renly clings to him during their goodbye kiss, tears in his eyes, and Oberyn kisses every one of his knuckles as he gently prises himself free. Thirty seconds later the train door is closing for the last time with Oberyn on the other side of it, the train picking up speed around the bend, and Renly closes his eyes and starts at last to cry.  

  4. **WATERLOO**  
Oberyn’s never been one for history; as far as he’s concerned, the past belongs exactly there - in the past. All the same, seeing the boy getting so excited about all of the places he’s studied at school, the battlefields and the churches and the museums, as Oberyn shows him around Seville, he’s utterly charmed. Renly Baratheon has all the stars of the sky in his eyes, the brightest smile Oberyn’s ever seen, and despite himself, he’s genuinely considering taking him home tonight.  

  5. **WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE ME?**  
Renly’s not surprised that Oberyn’s not much of a cuddler. He’s more than happy to be  _intimate_ , yes, to hold him close as they’re fucking, to kiss his hair and stroke it back off his face, to whisper in his ear; he’ll do all of those things for Renly, but the moment that Renly snuggles up whenever he’s not hard or getting that way, Oberyn laughs and slings an arm around his shoulders before pushing him away again, and no matter how gentle, how kind, he always is, it never stops stinging just that little bit.   

  6. **KISSES OF FIRE**  
Renly’s had many, many,  _many_  kisses over his short life so far. At seventeen, he’s had more partners than most people twice his age, and as such, considers himself something of a connoisseur of kisses (amongst other things). At seventeen he meets Oberyn Martell in Seville and quickly learns that he knows  _nothing_  when it comes to kissing.  

  7. **ANDANTE, ANDANTE**  
The first time they sleep together, it’s not at all how Renly expects. From the way he’s learned to have sex - as quick and fierce as he can make it, so he can feel it days later, so he  _knows_  he’s been fucked and felt that brief fulfilment - he expects to be rolled over and dragged up on all fours, told to grasp the bedstead and take it like a good boy. What happens is Oberyn laying him down on the mattress, his fingers light and teasing over Renly’s skin as he arches and begs for more, harder, anything; Oberyn smirks, leaning down to kiss him slow and heated, and teaches him that the best things come to those who wait.  

  8. **KNOWING ME, KNOWING YOU**  
Loras misses him. It’s only a brief break up (if you can even call it a break up, given that they were never actually together in the first place), he knows, and yet the fact that he knows nothing about how Renly’s doing whilst he hides out at Robb’s recovering from Loras’ stupid, thoughtless,  _cruel_  words is killing him. Loras texts Robb constantly asking for his help, asking what to do to make it better; he gets a response maybe once, and even then, it’s telling him to bugger off and leave Renly alone. He doesn’t give up. The only way to show Renly he  _does_  care is to persist, to make sure he knows that Loras isn’t going anywhere.  

  9. **ANGEL EYES**  
For a long time after their breakup, Renly can’t close his eyes without seeing the expression in Loras’ brown eyes when Renly finally confessed. There’d been a terrible pity in those amber depths, mixed with revulsion and shock, and Renly’s stomach had flipped. There’d been so many times that Loras had looked at him fondly, even flirtatiously - eyes sparkling gold, mischievous and heated and coy by turns - and to see that expression in them, even only for a couple of seconds, had destroyed Renly more absolutely than anything since his schooldays.  

  10. **I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR YOU**  
Loras is fidgeting on the doorstep, shuffling from foot to foot awkwardly, when Renly looks out of his bedroom window. He glances at his mirror and winces at the reflection there: a face the colour of milk, with bruiselike shadows under the eyes, surrounded by a bird’s nest of black hair. He tries to yank the worst of the tangles out with his fingers before making his way back downstairs and opening the door. Loras looks up, and those eyes - so nervous, so soft, so clear - meeting his sets Renly’s heart to fluttering.  

  11. **FERNANDO**  
There are stars in the sky above them, a bonfire crackling and spitting sparks into the night air where it burns on the beach in front of them. Oberyn sees him shivering and passes him his jacket, leather and smelling of smoke, whiskey and aftershave; Renly buries his nose in the collar and breathes deep, sure he’ll remember that smell for the rest of his life. Oberyn’s hand comes up to his face, tilting his chin up, just looking at him. His eyes are dark, warm, on Renly’s; they’re alone on the beach, wrapped up in each other entirely, and Renly never wants the night to end.  

  12. **MY LOVE, MY LIFE**  
_CASSANA and STEFFON BARATHEON_  
_MUCH LOVED, DEARLY MISSED_  
Stannis takes him to the grave. Renly doesn’t remember the people who lie in it, their parents. He’s told he has his mother’s blue eyes and his father’s coal black hair, Cassana’s dimples and Steffon’s strong nose; he’s seen photographs, a pretty woman holding a baby and a handsome man with a strong jaw and a thick beard with a hand on each of his elder sons’ shoulders. Renly puts the flowers down where Stannis tells him, and they walk away.  

  13. **THE DAY BEFORE YOU CAME**  
Robb doesn’t believe in fate. He doesn’t like the idea that Renly was always going to end up the way he did; that the universe scripted itself to torture and beat down his best friend until all that was left was a shell. He doesn’t believe that things happen because some higher power designs it that way; he’s a realist, he thinks that there’s a specific and traceable line of events that drop the blocks that way, like tetris. All the same, he thinks the hand that lines up the dominoes of Loras Tyrell’s arrival in Renly’s life is finally doing something right.  
Renly’s eyes are bright and clear when he bounds into Robb’s bedroom, spouting off about the handsomest boy he’s ever seen sitting next to Renly on the bus to campus and, even better, joining Renly in his English seminar. Robb, who knows Loras Tyrell from football, doesn’t say a word. He knows everything he’s got to say isn’t something Renly wants to hear. For someone who’s been through all the worst the world has to offer, Renly’s a romantic, and this time more than any other, Robb wants him to be right.




End file.
